The Long Road Home
by Aromene
Summary: He knows he’s only just started down a road that he’s going to have to walk the rest of his life.  He’s just immensely glad he has friends with him now.


**Disclaimer: I don****'****t own them, the city, or, really, anything.**

**AN: Tag for ****The**** Hive, because there just aren****'****t enough repercussions after Rodney****'****s ****encounter**** with the enzyme.**

**Summary: He knows he****'****s only just started down a road that he****'****s going to have to walk the rest of his life. He****'****s just ****immensely**** glad he has friends with him now.**

* * *

When Rodney wakes his head is pounding and every muscle in his body aches, but his thoughts are finally, thankfully, _mercifully_, coherent. The infirmary is quiet; practically deserted.

"Carson?" There is a moment of silence in which he briefly panics that he has been left alone, before Carson pokes his head out of his office. He looks, to sum it up in simple words, like crap.

"Oh, you're awake."

"Yes, yes, I'm awake. Good call there, Doctor Beckett. Now, I have a pounding headache and I need to get to work. How long has it been? Oh god, has there been word. Are they…" He trails off because he really can't bring himself to finish the sentence out loud, even if he does so in his head.

"Calm down, Rodney," Carson placates. "We've heard nothing, I'm afraid. And you came through the Gate roughly thirty-one hours ago."

"Thirty-one!" Rodney can't keep the squeak out of his voice. God, thirty-one hours on a hive ship. They're dead; they must be dead. He's pulling off wires and reaching for the tape over the IV by the time Carson reaches him.

"Rodney stop. Stop!" He picks up where Rodney left off, sighing in exhaustion and exasperation. "I'll let you up, because I know you won't even consider resting, but you have to promise me you'll eat and that you will rest. Even if you haven't found them. Your body has been through bloody hell the last day, and it's going to take time before you're completely well again."

"Right, right, good, good. Of course. Sure. Anything." Carson takes all these words with a grain of salt because he's pretty sure Rodney didn't hear a word he said.

"Rodney, I mean it. You very nearly died coming down off that enzyme dose – and don't think we won't be having a talk about that – and you need to take it slow."

"Slow will not save Sheppard and the others. I need clothes."

"Aye, I'll bring you something. And food. Wait here." Carson throws him a glance as he exits the room, and Rodney suddenly has a moment to wonder what he can't remember in the last thirty hours. Because Carson's treating him differently, and it's not just from absolute exhaustion.

He returns a few minutes later with a sandwich and one of Rodney's uniforms.

"Carson, um, what happened? I mean, did I, uh, say anything….incredibly stupid?"

The look Carson gives him makes Rodney's heart sink to his toes. "Oh god. What did I—"

"You had no idea what you were saying, lad. It's in the past. We're just glad to have you back to your old self."

Which doesn't help Rodney's state of mind one wit. "Did I, uh, hurt anyone?"

"No, lad. Not even a bruise," but it's clear that Carson knows that's not what Rodney meant and has no intention of answering the question.

"Right, well, that's good." He pulls on his jacket and stuffs half a sandwich in his mouth in the same move, and Carson can't help but give him a weary smile. "Thanks," Rodney says, because he can't think of what else to say.

"Aye, well, you're welcome."

Rodney stares at him another minute and then makes a beeline for the door. He'll worry about what Carson's not saying later, but right now he knows that nothing is more important than Sheppard and Teyla and Ronon, and even Ford stuck on a Hive ship _somewhere_.

* * *

Afterwards, when he returns to Atlantis to find that Sheppard and the others are still alive, he is too relieved to worry about Carson. Instead he follows Sheppard down to the mess for dinner. 

"So, Rodney, how did you get back to Atlantis? Didn't Ford leave any goons to watch you?"

"Um, yeah, two." He really doesn't want to have this conversation.

"Well?" But then, Sheppard's never been one to take 'no' or 'fine' for an answer, even if they are his two favourite ways of responding to others.

"Yeah. Um, I took some of the enzyme."

John stares at him like he's crazy, which Rodney it starting to think might be justified. "Well, it worked," he says, defensively. "Took them both out no problem. Got the crystals, got home, spend thirty hours detoxing cold turkey, and now everything is just brilliant."

"You could have died!" It's probably a bit louder than John intends it to be, because most of the mess turns to stare at them.

"Um, yeah. Trust me, Carson already read me the riot act. I don't need to hear it again. Yesterday was not one of my best days, I get that."

"Rodney, you saw what that stuff did to Ford. How could you even have considered –"

"Look, I figured something was wrong with the rest of you, _rightly_ I might add, and I did the only thing I could think of to get off that planet and get help from Atlantis. It wasn't the best idea, but it damn well _worked_."

"So what now?"

"Don't know," Rodney admits. "I mean, it's out of my system, but I guess if I ever go near it again, bad things will happen."

"Like Ford."

"Yeah, probably. And since that would be a considerably waste of my very large brain power, I plan to stay well clear of the stuff for, oh, _eternity_."

"Good." John gives him a look that leaves him no doubt that even if he wanted to he'd never get near the stuff again. "So, cold turkey? That must have sucked."

"Yeah, um, I don't really remember all that much after I came through the Gate. But judging by how crappy Carson looked after I woke up, I think it's safe to say the entire experience was pretty damn awful. I haven't really…that is, I don't really want to know."

"Can't say I blame you." John finished eating the last of his dinner. "Well, I'd best catch up with Lorne. Make sure none of the marines killed anyone while I was gone. Night, Rodney."

"Yeah, night." Rodney finishes up the last of his meal in the silence that John's departure leaves.

He debates going down to his lab, because it has now been three days since he checked any of his projects, but he can't quite bring himself to care. In the last day his entire team has nearly died _again_, and it's becoming so much of a habit that he's no longer surprised either that it happened or that they survived.

His feet lead him to the infirmary, and he swears at the traitorous appendages. He knows he needs to talk to Carson, but he really has no idea what to say, except to apologize, but he isn't really sure what he's apologizing for.

"Oh, Rodney, I didna expect you back here. Are you feeling alright?" Carson still looked like crap, but since he was still standing, Rodney figured he must have slept at some point while the Daedalus was away.

"I, uh, we, uh, need to talk."

"Rodney, I already told you; I canna hold anything against you when you didna know what you were saying. Let it be, lad."

"What the hell did I say?!"

Carson looked momentarily guilty. "Aw, crap, Carson, what did I say to you?"

"You might have insulted me a few times, lad, but it's not as if you've never done that before."

"And…?" He doesn't really want to know, but whatever he said is bothering Carson immensely and if he's going to apologize for being an idiot he would rather know what he said first.

"And ya may have claimed I was jealous of you getting all the girls."

Rodney's face goes blank. "I said _what_?! I did not! There's no way! Girls? I don't _get_ girls. Sheppard _gets_ girls. I get…children and beaten to a bloody pulp!"

"Aye, well, I told ya I couldn't hold it against you. Seeing as it wasn't true."

"Because I feel so much better insulting you with falsehoods!"

"Calm down, Rodney; you'll wake the entire city. Let it go, lad. I don't blame you for anything you said."

"Well bully for you! I blame me!" He half falls into the nearest chair. "God, Carson, you sat up with me all night, listened to me berate you in probably large and mostly intelligible words, and you don't blame me just a little bit for being _out of my mind_?"

"No."

"Oh, well then. Glad we had this talk. I'll just…uh…go…to bed. Yes, bed. Because you told me rest was good."

"Rodney," Carson's voice stops him before he's gone more than a few feet. "I'm just glad you're alright. I…I was just a might worried you wouldn't be."

"Thanks Carson."

He goes back to his room because he is, although he'd never admit it, actually exhausted. He really doesn't know what to make of his conversation with Carson, except that he is now positive he said something spectacularly cruel while under the influence of the enzyme and he's really confused as to why Carson doesn't seem to have taken it to heart. He's also incredibly grateful. The fact that he came within a hairsbreadth of death again is something he really doesn't want to think about.

He also doesn't want to think about how absolutely insane he was when he took the enzyme dose. He's well, at least he seems to be physically, but he's worried that he's not quite there mentally. Because whether he is actually willing to admit it to himself or not, he liked how it felt to be that strong. He understands why Ford was so addicted to it. And that is absolutely, positively, _terrifying_.

He wonders if this will be similar to being a recovering alcoholic. If he'll always have that urge to try it _just one more time_. Because he tried to stop drinking coffee once after grad school and he'd pretty much had a breakdown after two days. And that was just _coffee_, a substance not naturally addictive.

He's pretty damn sure he's screwed. And isn't that just a lovely thought. His will power is roughly the same as his courage, so unless Sheppard or Carson are there every single time he encounters the enzyme in the future, he really doesn't trust himself to not give in.

He knows he's only just started down a road that he's going to have to walk the rest of his life. He's just immensely glad he has friends with him now.


End file.
